Florida State: Unbeaten and Untested

In Contrast to Tigers, Seminoles Took the Path of Least Resistance

NEWPORT BEACH, Calif.—Monday's college-football national championship is a matchup between one team, Auburn, that survived this season with quadruple-bypass surgery and another team, Florida State, whose trip here was basically a long stroll on the beach.

But the bewildering question before the Bowl Championship Series title game isn't if Auburn's season was too stressful. It's whether Florida State's was stressful enough.

In racing out to a 13-0 record, the top-ranked Seminoles ran up a 42-point margin of victory this season, by far the largest of any team ever to play for the BCS title, according to Stats LLC. Heisman Trophy wining quarterback Jameis Winston was required in the fourth quarter of only seven games this season and threw just 27 passes in that period. During one game, wide receiver Kenny Shaw said, Florida State's starters were pulled in time for him to enjoy the view of a tipsy fan stumbling down stadium steps.

Then there was the time some Florida State players spent the second half of a game playing Hangman. It was a snoozy November blowout—one of four in a row for Florida State—when some Seminoles were understandably restless on the sideline. So they decided to distract themselves with a game of their own.

When they saw a whiteboard, Florida State defensive back Terrence Brooks said, "we had a Hangman session." Brooks insisted that one of the words he spelled was "CHAMPION." Yet he wasn't planning to stage a rematch Monday. "We won't be bored," he said. "I promise we won't be bored."

Would they be better off Monday if they had been tested during the regular season? This is a barstool debate as ancient as sports—and beer—particularly in a season when one loss doesn't discount a team from winning a championship. Winston staked out his position on the matter this week.

"The NCAA has all these rules," he said, "but it does not say you cannot blow out everybody you play."

In practice, Florida State tries to simulate the pressure that its opponents are unable to provide, Winston's teammates said Saturday. Its practice tempo is so fast that it tires out Seminoles wide receiver Rashad Greene more than Saturdays do. In their two-minute-drill rehearsals, Florida State coach Jimbo Fisher ratchets up the intensity by blasting a roaring hum of static, which makes the team's practice facility sound like a hangar of 747s. And for Florida State's offense, no defense is as tricky as the one it picks apart during the week, since the Seminoles rank No. 1 in scoring defense.

On the Rose Bowl's other sideline Monday is a team that has taken the opposite approach. Auburn somehow got here having lost a game and having won games that it had all but lost. It stole the Southeastern Conference championship despite being projected in the preseason to finish dead last. Its last two games in November, when Florida State's average winning margin was 47 points and its starters were busy playing Hangman, ended on miraculous plays that redefined what is possible in college football. "There's nothing you can do to simulate that in practice," Auburn defensive back Ryan White said.

Of course, Florida State is far from the first team to make it to the national championship without much huffing and puffing. The average winning margin of the 32 teams in BCS title games was 26 points. Four other teams in the BCS era racked up winning margins of more than 35 points, but their record in the title game was 2-2, including a loss by Florida State to end the 2000 season, when the Seminoles beat teams by an average of 35.4 points.

Florida State's starters spent the week leading into Monday's showdown saying they would be comfortable in the chaos of a national championship. But some said even against Auburn, the spiffiest team on their schedule, the Seminoles were hoping they would remember their contingency planning as if it were a fire drill.

There's no way FSU wins. They have the Heisman Trophy winner at quarterback--a terrible omen if ever there were one for a team playing in a championship game. And Auburn has got God, or karma, or something like it, on their side. Auburn's a decent team that would give FSU a good game even without their extra magic. With the magic, Auburn wins, in miraculous fashion.

But this'll be the last for Auburn for awhile. The magic will be all used up after tonight.

Though only one game, FSU completely dismantled Clemson, a team likely to finish in the Top Ten in BCS rankings. Tonight's game could be a blow out or it could be competitive. I guess that's why they play the game.

Well, we shall see. I would say that Alabama is still the best, but not after the Sugar Bowl disaster. Auburn did luck out a couple of times, but they also earned the rest. It will be a very interesting game; at least in the first half. Personally I home FSU is playing hangman on the sidelines again, but I doubt it.

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